Durability of Industrial Composites

This book guides readers on predicting the durability of any laminate in any chemical environment subjected to any loading--cyclic, static, or a combination thereof. The focus is on long-term in-service durability and the book provides quantitative answers to all durability issues of composite materials in industrial service.

Durability of Industrial Composites offers numerical and quantitative solutions to long-term composite failures that are useful to practicing engineers, researchers, and students. All modes of laminate long-term failure are contemplated, with resin toughness and environmental conditions considered. The book develops a simple unified equation to compute the load-dependent durability of laminates under the simultaneous action of cyclic and static loads. The load-independent durability and residual life of equipment immersed in corrosive chemicals are also discussed. The book presents a full discussion of the elusive strain-corrosion mode of failure as well as a complete solution to the durability issue of underground sanitation pipes. The currently accepted durability parameters of HDB, Sb and Sc are discarded as incorrect and replaced with the appropriate threshold parameters. The entirely new concept of the "anomalous failure" is fully discussed and solved. The effects of overpressure and spike strains, as well as of the operating temperature and moisture, are quantitatively evaluated and illustrated in numerical examples.